Claims Of More Severe Weather With Warming Are Based On IPCC Errors and Omissions

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Reports are the ‘scientific’ source of claims for more severe and extreme weather. In fact the incidence and severity of extreme weather— hurricanes, wind storms, tornados, heat waves, drought, floods, ice storms, etc—have not generally increased recently and are well within long term natural variability.

IPCC are also wrong because in their models the data on which they are built is insufficient, the basic physics incorrect, and major mechanisms are inadequate or missing. But don’t take my word for it as the IPCC don’t hide their limitations.[1] Instead they know people, especially the media, don’t read or understand the Science Report. They, cynically produce a Summary for Policymakers (SPM) written with a certainty completely unjustified by the Science Report.

The IPCC claim that polar temperatures will increase more than tropical with warming. This reduces the temperature contrast across the Polar Front, the main boundary between polar and tropical air. Frequency and intensity of all middle latitude (30-65°) severe weather is a function of this temperature contrast and including intense low pressure systems and tornadoes. It is evident in North America along what is called Tornado Alley. Reduce that contrast, traditionally called the Zonal Index, and severe weather potential is decreased.

Hurricanes are tropical; witness the terminology problems that developed when Sandy moved north and weakened. They form in all tropical oceans (0-30°), but Atlantic ones receive more media attention as the damage to expensive human structures is greater.

The Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO) is a major mechanism in the formation and intensity of hurricanes. It’s an oscillation in the direction and intensity of upper level tropical winds. These reflect the link between the lower stratosphere and the troposphere and are used for hurricane predictions.

The IPCC says:

“Due to the computational cost associated with the requirement of a well-resolved stratosphere, the models employed for the current assessment do not generally include the QBO.”

Hurricanes develop from tropical Easterly Waves fueled by moisture evaporated from warm tropical water. The IPCC tells us, “Unfortunately, the total surface heat and water fluxes are not well observed.” The thunderstorms circle into tropical storms beyond 8° of latitude where Coriolis Force becomes effective and only become hurricanes when wind speed exceeds 120 kph. Energy transfers from the ocean to fuel the thunderstorms that form the wall around the eye of the hurricane. They are massive and powerful but too small to show up on the large grid of the IPCC computer models.

As Essex and McKitrick (E & M) explain:

“at this moment, and at every moment, there are thousands of active thunderstorms in the hot, moist places of the planet. There are tens of millions of them in any year. It should be clear that this great and constant roar of atmospheric air conditioning is an important part of the global energy budget and should figure significantly into any model of the global climate. However the mighty creature overhead, along with all of its cousins, is too small to show up in even the biggest and grandest global climate models. They are in the jargon of the field, sub grid scale -computerese for” they fall between the cracks.”

The IPCC concede; “The spatial resolution of the coupled ocean-atmosphere models used in the IPCC assessment is generally not high enough to resolve tropical cyclones, and especially to simulate their intensity.”

There’s virtually no data from the vast oceans that dominate the tropics so the IPCC applied parameterization to create data. They use model output as ‘real’ data input for another model. The IPCC comment reveals the speculative nature of the process: “The differences between parameterizations are an important reason why climate model results differ.”

E & M comment:

“The use of such parameterization means the resulting computer calculation procedures are models and not computations of basic theory. Climate models do not represent a theory for climate… Therefore, forecasting climate change with a model, in lieu of the theory is a dicey proposition. Parameterizations do not normally conform to the laws of physics, and it is only the laws of physics that are guaranteed not to change with climate. There is no such guarantee for parameterizations.”

IPCC history is replete with confrontations, but usually orchestrated PR responses deflect them. Most were only significant to people who knew the scientific deception being practiced. Chris Landsea a major authority on hurricanes and currently Science and Operations Officer at the National Hurricane Center was an IPCC member until his resignation in 2005. In a public letter he itemized concern about politicization of the IPCC, and specifically his input on hurricanes. Major conflict was with Kevin Trenberth, long time participant and hyper-advocate for IPCC science.

Landsea wrote,

“Trenberth participated in a press conference organized by scientists at Harvard on the topic “Experts to warn global warming likely to continue spurring more outbreaks of intense hurricane activity” along with other media interviews on the topic.”

In 2006 Landsea co-authored a paper showing there was no link between hurricanes and global warming.

It’s likely the Harvard conference was organized by John Holdren, later Obama’s Science Czar but then professor of environmental policy and director of the Program on Science, Technology, and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. While at Harvard Holdren organized the 2003 vicious attacks on Baliunas and Soon because they published historical evidence of the Medieval Warm Period. (MWP).

Public interest and concern about global warming had declined. Sandy was barely and very briefly a Category I hurricane, but provided an opportunity to scare the public again. The problem is the science and evidence are still incorrect. It won’t make any difference because climate science remains political propaganda and the truth is not required. As Will Rogers said, “If you ever injected truth into politics you would have no politics.”

Informative and educational article.
There is an odd (possibly coincidental, but worth noting) correlation between the past Arctic atmospheric pressure and the Atlantic accumulated cyclone energy ACE.http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/AHA.htm

REPLY: No, not really, they are just MS Word bookmark links within the document that don’t translate to web, but I’ve added the URL to the IPCC chapter 8 for the Google impaired. Thanks for pointing it out -A

1 “like” by a self-admitted “mad medic” that clings to his guns and bible and you ludicrousy claim to be”most viewed”? By what? Dirty energy RWNJs no doubt… you should be ashamed and embarassed to mislabel the IPCC in such a ridiculous sham…

I may be wrong,but basic science,as told to me by my 15 year grand-daughter,is that as the poles warm a wee bit,this decreases the temerature difference between them and the tropics,thus decreasing the severity of and number of storms.Also,doesn,t the past indicate colder weather around the poles,more really “severe” weather? Well,as least she hasn’t drank the Kool-aid,as she thinks Sesame Street is more fact based then the Gorebull and the IPCC…:):)

Great job again as always. I love the work you did/do with Kim Greenhouse .All the people I know and have problems with the idea of ‘Climate Change’ I tell them to listen to those interviews. Let me know when you come to Europe in your web page and if it’s near Barcelona and you can’t find a place to sleep don’t hesitate. We all know that climate is not the problem but just one of the many ways they use to take our freedom away.

@jeb
I thought Left Wing Nut Jobs were supposed to be well educated. Your shocking lack of literacy is appalling!
Do you have a point to make? Do you have some data to counter the arguments in this post?
Unless you can show otherwise, we can all see that it the IPCC that is the sham.

I am not wanting to single out vukcevic in particular — many commenters at WUWT present similar apparent graphical correlations as scientific evidence — but the above comment happens to be positioned against a head post that discusses, among other things, the distinction between “parameterizations” and predictions based on a model that ” conforms to the laws of physics”. Curve fitting exercises are in a sense the ultimate “parameterizations”. While the apparent correlation may be true of a certain historical period there is no guarantee it will hold up under other circumstances if there is no theoretical basis for the relationship. The criticisms of IPCC modeling in the head post are much more telling because they link evidence with the gaps in the theoretical underpinnings of the models. Many skeptics need to be more disciplined in focusing on evidence that has some theoretical explanation for the correlation. Science is more than collecting and presenting data.

I’m glad this information is here, however, I’m afraid we’ve reached the “tipping point” where too many people don’t actually want freedom; instead, they want government to care of them. Once this point is reached, logical arguments will fall on deaf ears. Even if the science battle could be won, the political battle is essentially over, and their tactics have been sufficient to gain the power they wanted.

Did Sandy elect Obama? Or was it voter fraud? No, the problem is, this election shouldn’t have been close. Since when does America believe in socialism? Since the NEA designed school curricula. Since Universities became overrun with marxists. Since Viet Nam radicals grew up, cloaked their politics, and wormed their way into positions of power. Since the Great Society ensnared milions and destroyed communities. Regulators are out of control, and Congress will do nothing to rein them in. Because the last presidential election wasn’t a landslide the other way, it tells me we are past the tipping point. It’s going to be an ugly downhill ride from here.

I suppose there is still some hope to reverse our condition, but people are overwhelmed by the firehose of propaganda. To make a difference, somehow the public need to catch on to the idea the govt/media complex lie to them, and make their lives worse. But they are dependent now on govt services, and if these decline slowly they’ll keep taking what they can get. They don’t believe in the American Dream, that life will be better for the next generation. And our economy has been manipulated into decline, so even if you wanted to work, there is no work to take – that is if you want to live in the middle class. This is the deconstruction of America. I think they’ve won. It will be obvious after we lose the next big war they get us into.

1) IPCC says
The IPCC claim that polar temperatures will increase more than tropical with warming.
2) Tim Ball says
Frequency and intensity of all middle latitude (30-65°) severe weather is a function of this temperature contrast and including intense low pressure systems and tornadoes. It is evident in North America along what is called Tornado Alley. Reduce that contrast, traditionally called the Zonal Index, and severe weather potential is decreased.

The internet is amazing. I wanted to understand a little more about parameterization so I googled “IPCC applied parameterization examples” and the page Dr. Ball is quoting came up first. IThe page notes “Cloud parametrizations are based on physical theories that aim to describe the statistics of the cloud field (e.g., the fractional cloudiness or the area-averaged precipitation rate) without describing the individual cloud”

It only takes 5% increase in global preciptiation to counteract the full global warming effect. Do the models assume constant precipitation as the earth warms?

jeb says:
November 25, 2012 at 6:04 am
1 “like” by a self-admitted “mad medic” that clings to his guns and bible and you ludicrousy claim to be”most viewed”? By what? Dirty energy RWNJs no doubt… you should be ashamed and embarassed to mislabel the IPCC in such a ridiculous sham…
>>>>>>>>>>>>

There was a time when trolls showed up on this forum shouting facts and theories and explanations. They soon wound up looking foolish as their misconceptions and misunderstandings were exposed by the ensuing dialogue.

Now they just hurl insults and unsubstantiated accusations that have nothing to do with the topic at hand. This is unfair. They’ve skipped the bad science and the dialogue and gone straight to the looking foolish phase. I demand a better class of troll!

The claim for more severe and extreme weather seems exactly opposite what the AGW folks ought to be preaching. Now, we in the USA approach the end of 2012 with (apparently) a record low number of tornadoes and, despite Storm Sandy, not many landfall hurricanes either.
Further, the AGW folks have not accepted the concept of natural variability in Earths climate and weather. Soon, I expect, some of them will abandon the “severe and extreme weather” idea. They can’t really accept natural variability without fatality damaging their whole ideology. But to abandon the more bad weather idea will place anyone in conflict with the IPCC Summary for Policymakers (SPM) and with Gore-a-thon. I wonder who will be first and how they will open this internal brawl?

Although I was able to follow the “vicious attacks” link, the page I found there was a little light on support for the term “vicious.” Is anyone aware of a link to information more demonstrative of that element?

Storms are caused by an energy imbalance. So if it goes from cold to hot they happen. Also from hot to cold. So I reckon Al Gore knows this and is using the expected transition from hot to cold to say “Dirty Weather, ‘told you so”. Expect the AGW gravy train to make a lot of noise before it dies.

On one side of the fence you have those who want to deal with reality. On the other are those who have a vision of reality they want to realize. On one side is science. On the other is a liars’ contest.

Since I’m not a scientist, there must have been some surprise to Dr. John v. Kampen, a physicist and science writer with whom I sometimes quip, when I found a political model explaining Anthropogenic Global Warming Dec 1 2009. ( Now, I’m well aware that rants and self important people abound – and I’ve put in my fair share at http://opitslinkfest.blogspot.ca/p/environmental-challenges.html ) He was kind enough to point out some YouTube videos by our favourite British lord and I commenced collecting articles. That was almost 3 years ago.
Some political input for the scientifically astute wondering why things are in such a muddle.

But don’t take my word for it as the IPCC don’t hide their limitations.

They, cynically produce a Summary for Policymakers (SPM) written with a certainty completely unjustified by the Science Report.

These reflect the link between the lower stratosphere and the troposphere and are used for hurricane predictions.

The thunderstorms circle into tropical storms beyond 8° of latitude where Coriolis Force becomes effective and only become hurricanes when wind speed exceeds 120 kph.

There’s virtually no data from the vast oceans that dominate the tropics so the IPCC applied parameterization to create data.

Chris Landsea a major authority on hurricanes and currently Science and Operations Officer at the National Hurricane Center was an IPCC member until his resignation in 2005.

It’s likely the Harvard conference was organized by John Holdren, later Obama’s Science Czar but then professor of environmental policy and director of the Program on Science, Technology, and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.

Sandy was barely and very briefly a Category I hurricane, but provided an opportunity to scare the public again.

It won’t make any difference because climate science remains political propaganda and the truth is not required.

A little proofreading, preferably by someone who didn’t write the article, can go a long way.

Peter Hartley says:
November 25, 2012 at 7:21 amI am not wanting to single out vukcevic in particular — many commenters at WUWT present similar apparent graphical correlations as scientific evidence.

Hi Peter.
And why not?
Now you’ve done it, his comment does say ‘ (possibly coincidental, but worth noting)’.
vukcevic is known for finding large number of apparently ‘spurious’ correlations. If it is in the date it is worth noting. In physics often effect is found first, then it is explained after find can be confirmed.
In the ‘climate science’ temperature rise is first explained by the AGW, but finding good ‘correlation’ is still elusive, or at least vukcevic can not see it, but the ‘Arctic spurious correlation’ he says ‘has it’http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/CO2-Arc.htm

Nik (not a sheep) says
Storms are caused by an energy imbalance. So if it goes from cold to hot they happen. Also from hot to cold. So I reckon Al Gore knows this and is using the expected transition from hot to cold to say “Dirty Weather, ‘told you so”. Expect the AGW gravy train to make a lot of noise before it dies.
Henry says.
simple, but true.
Unfortunately too few people have figured that out that one yet. \
Seeing that now that has not been warming, they have changed everything from “global warming” to “climate change”

Joe Born says:
November 25, 2012 at 8:24 am
Although I was able to follow the “vicious attacks” link, the page I found there was a little light on support for the term “vicious.” Is anyone aware of a link to information more demonstrative of that element?

I think the second article (April 17, 2003) is the one mentioned. You will need to click through to that. It has been several years since I looked at it but if you have not, do so, and form your own ideas.

. . . wherein, Steve Mc, links to a paper with this comment
“The Hockey Team mauling of Soon and Baliunas was quickly disseminated in blog world. Here’s one example from a quick google:”
by Chris Mooney, titled ‘Some Like it Hot’.http://theparagraph.com/some-like-it-hot/

The warmists and apologists for the IPCC claim that all the above is nitpicking; the grand picture is what counts.

The IPCC promoted CAGW narrative is worthy of consideration only if the details are correct. It purports to describe not a train, but a runaway train. If the train, though moving faster at times like now, is not actually a runaway, there is no worry. The detail here is “runaway”.

The IPCC “runaway” shows up as truth in the details of its predictions (not scenarios: those are various outcomes based on a series of varying either false assumptions or correct “truths”). If you do not have the details showing up, you do not have a runaway but only the ol’ train moving along a track with varying grades.

The dismissal of details in preference to the grand truth is a liberal-arts comment along the lines of improving the quality of Men (the workers) while reducing the quality of a man (a factory owner, the >$30 grand/year 1% minority). It is unfortunately untrue in this aspect also, as the quantum of wealth held by a very small minority (though unfair) would not significantly improve the masses by an equal redistribution, and as the State-central economies has shown, taking away private means of production does not even maintain the amount or quality of production. In social politics, these are the details that are dismissed at our peril.

As time goes on and, I feel I observe, at an accelerating pace, we are able to document the failure of the “details” of the CAGW story. We are on a train working its way across a hummocky landscape, not on a runaway heading for a curve it cannot handle.

Good stuff, this. This is the unappreciated effort that ended poor, old women and their defenders from being burnt at the stake.

In the UK we are being told by our political leaders that this years floods are being caused by “climate change” but we have seen flooding very often in the past so what is changing. I think what our politicians are doing is using “severe weather” to try and herd people into accepting the AGW lie.

In contrast, especially since “global” warming is primarily arctic and high-latitude warming, global warming decreases the temperature difference between the poles and the tropics. Reduced temperature differences lead to reduced convective heat transfer and reduced convection between those regions, reduced average storminess.

As this article quite rightly points out:

“The IPCC claim that polar temperatures will increase more than tropical with warming. This reduces the temperature contrast across the Polar Front, the main boundary between polar and tropical air. Frequency and intensity of all middle latitude (30-65°) severe weather is a function of this temperature contrast and including intense low pressure systems and tornadoes. It is evident in North America along what is called Tornado Alley. Reduce that contrast, traditionally called the Zonal Index, and severe weather potential is decreased.”

The claim that global warming causes more storms overall is the utter opposite of truth, but, like other Big Lies, spread by incessant shameless repetition in propaganda until people assume something said so often must be true, despite being baseless compared to reality.

Probably some of the CAGW movement realize the start of global cooling, in contrast ( http://s10.postimage.org/l9gokvp09/composite.jpg — click to enlarge and see upper right), will cause more storms as cooling increases the temperature difference between the equator and high latitudes. (The equator never changes temperature much, but high latitude regions become still colder, still further away from tropical temperatures). So they are increasingly emphasizing the “extreme weather” propaganda to take advantage of it, figuring they can fudge the temperature datasets (Hansen’s GISS and CRU’s HADCRUT) meanwhile enough to hide the decline and blame the weather on global warming (rebranded as the meaningless propaganda term “climate change,” as if the climate was ever a flat constant and unchanging, to form an unfalsifiable hypothesis anathema to true science). I think they will fail after several years from there being too much cooling to hide, but we’ll see.

donald penman says
In the UK we are being told by our political leaders that this years floods are being caused by “climate change” but we have seen flooding very often in the past so what is changing. I think what our politicians are doing is using “severe weather” to try and herd people into accepting the AGW lie.

donald penman says:
November 25, 2012 at 9:52 pm
In the UK we are being told by our political leaders that this years floods are being caused by “climate change” but we have seen flooding very often in the past so what is changing.

I’ve read that a partial factor has been a sharp drop in river dredging since around 2000–partly at the urging of greenies who don’t want the minnows hassled.

There are a number of reasons that could be put forward as to why we have had major flooding in the UK recently(the last 10 years) it could be that it has become colder but there are other reasons such as the increasing population and building houses on floodplains in particular.In Lincoln we have had a problem with flooding recently because of blocked drains that could not get rid of surface water fast enough but parts of the city have always had a problem with flooding going back 30-40 years as I recall which have been solved over the years.Flooding is not a problem that started recently in the UK in my opinion.

If anyone mentions ‘climate change’ in any context I stop them and say do you mean climate change caused by global warming, allegedly due to carbon dioxide? This invariably makes them stop and think. It works best with people new to the bandwagon who are not always aware of the root of ‘climate change’ and haven’t bothered to think about it before.

I was also surprised with the flood coverage on good old Auntie Beeb (BBC in UK) the last evening. You could have knocked me down with a feather when the reporter said ‘of course, flooding of this type is not new’ and cut to archive pictures of the flooding in 1939 and 1963 with reference to the dates. Is this a sign of the times, or can’t the censors keep up?

I claim more severe weather with cooling. Case in point, check out the West Coast forecast for the next 48 hours. May see some tornadic action, at an unnnnnnnprecedented early point in the season. How 2012, LOL!

Dr Tim Ball says (quoting E&M):
“at this moment, and at every moment, there are thousands of active thunderstorms in the hot, moist places of the planet. There are tens of millions of them in any year. It should be clear that this great and constant roar of atmospheric air conditioning …”
———————————————————————————————————-
You can hear this “great and constant roar” on the short-wave radio bands, particularly at the
lower end about 2Mhz – 7MHz. These static crashes are from the lightning flashes around the
world. It’s noisy out there!